Power minister picks holes in survey of religious structures
HERALD REPORTER
PANJIM, MARCH 18
Criticising the exercise conducted by the State administration for identifying unauthorized religious structures on public property, Power Minister Aleixo Sequeira today demanded a re-survey of such structures in the State.
As reported earlier, nearly 850 structures including temples, chapels andchurches besides ghumtis and crosses, have been identified by the State government as unauthorized on government land as well as Communidade property.
A notification has been issued by the Revenue Department in keeping with an order of the Supreme Court.
“I am of the opinion that the identification exercise has been done haphazardly and cannot be accepted”, Sequeira said at a press briefing in the Secretariat.
He also stated that he would raise the issue in the next cabinet meeting.
The minister gave the example of a 400- year old Verna church which has been identified as unauthorized. Quoting the notification, Sequeira said Fabrica de Verna is shown as the owner of the church. “So, how does it become illegal?”, he demanded to know. “When the church is in the property of Fabrica, how can the notification say it is an unauthorized or illegal structure in the government land?”
Secondly, he questioned as to how the government administration has included structures in Communidade land in their list. The Supreme court has mentioned about unauthorized religious structures in government land, he pointed out questioning the logic of the government to cover Communidade land as well.
Giving another example from the notification, he said the list has named Chapel of Necessidade in Verna as illegal. Stating that in the ownership column, the name of Antonio Nunes is mentioned, he wondered how it comes in the ambit of government land.
“Looks like the whole exercise is a joke”, he stated demanding that the government has to go for a fresh survey to identify fresh structures.
In the fresh survey, the government would have to ensure that some senior official is asked to verify what is identified before finalizing the list of structures.
The power minister said there are several other cases in which the ownership of the land is not government, for which he felt a fresh exercise has to be carried out.
Affidavit: He said the government must refrain from filing the affidavit before the Supreme Court with the list of structures notified. If this happens, it would be very difficult to correct the situation, he said adding that it would result in total chaos.
He further said that in his personal view most of the structures declared as illegal, are legal. There are some old structures which were in private properties but later the ownership changed because of land acquisition. “So do they become illegal?”, he asked.
